What we know about the attack on two Minnesota lawmakers

On Saturday, two minnesota state legislators were killed in their homes in what Governor Tim Walz called an “politically motivated” assassination attempt. The attacks left a dead politician and the other seriously injured.

The suspect, Vance Luther Boelter, was placed in police custody after being found in the rural woods during a huge manhunt. He was accused of two second degree murder leaders and two chiefs of attempted murder in the second degree.

The state representative, Melissa Hortman, and her husband, Mark, were shot dead at their home, said the governor.

She served the Minnesota House of Representatives for 20 years and was president of the Chamber from 2019 to 2025.

Under his mandate, Minnesota Democrats have adopted a variety of liberal laws which included the expansion of rights to abortion and legalization of recreational marijuana.

She was also known to work through the aisle. In one of his latest votes before the attack, reassured himself with the Republicans to support a bill provision which would make the undispleless state population inadmissible to the low -income health program.

State senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, were also killed several times and injured, but survived. They have undergone surgery.

The two legislators are democrats.

Ms. Hoffman shared a declaration on social networks after the incident, saying that she and her husband were “incredibly lucky to be alive” after being struck by a total combined of 17 balls.

“John hardens many surgical interventions at the moment and is closer to all hours of the exit of the woods,” wrote Ms. Hoffman.

She also expressed her sympathy for the loss of her colleagues at the State House.

“We are emptied and devastated by the loss of Melissa and Mark. We have no words. There is never a place for this kind of political hatred,” she wrote.

The police confirmed that the attacks occurred in the first hours of Saturday in the cities of Brooklyn Park and Champlin, in Minnesota.

Drew Evans, superintendent of Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said the police had received a call at 2:00 a.m. at local time (3:00 am Hae; 07:00 GMT) on an incident at Hoffman in Champlin.

Another call for police arrived at 3:35 am, when police checked Hortman’s home near Brooklyn Park.

The police discovered what looked like an emergency vehicle parked at home with flashing emergency lights.

Getting out of the house looked like someone who looked like a police officer, who immediately opened fire on police officers, returned to the house, then escaped on foot.

Mark Bruley, Brooklyn Park police chief, said the suspect “wore a vest with a taser, other equipment, a badge” poses as the application of the law in order to “manipulate their path to the house”.

The attacks aroused condemnation through the political spectrum. President Donald Trump said that “such horrible violence will not be tolerated.”

Meanwhile, American senator Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota democrat, called “an attack on everything we represent as a democracy”.

Police identified the suspect as Mr. Boelter, 57 years old. They did not give details on a possible pattern.

Former person appointed politics, Mr. Boelter was once a member of the same council for the development of the state labor as Hoffman.

“We do not know the nature of the relationship or if they really knew each other,” said Evans.

Investigators would have found a list of 70 “targets”, including the names of state democratic politicians, in a vehicle that the suspect led for the assassination.

Walz, deputy Ilhan Omar, the two American senators from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, and the Attorney General of Minnesota, Keith Ellison, were on the Hit list, according to local media.

The locations of Planned Parenthood, which provides abortions and contraception, were also on the list, said a person familiar with the investigation at Minnesota Star Tribune.

Surint Evans told journalists that he would not describe the notebook found in the car as a “manifesto” because it was not “a treaty on all kinds of ideology and writings”.

Mr. Boelter is an entrepreneur in security and religious missionary who worked in Africa and the Middle East, according to an online CV.

He preached once as a pastor in a church in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to Facebook Photos. He had often gone to the nation, indicates positions of his LinkedIn account.

An online video two years ago seemed to show him to a congregation, adding that he has a woman and five children.

Depending on his online profile.

According to KTTC, affiliated on local television, the only criminal history of Mr. Boelter in Minnesota were intended for traffic tickets, including violations of speed and parking.

He sent an SMS to a disturbing message to friends in a minneapolis residence, where he had rented a room and would remain one or two nights per week, Minnesota Star Tribune reports.

Mr. Boelter said: “I’m going to have gone for a while. Maybe having a short time, so I just want to let you know that I love you guys and I want it not left this way.”

On Sunday evening, police said they found Mr. Boelter after receiving information that he had been seen in the Green Isle district, a village not far from his home.

The officers described the two -day search for the “greatest human hunting in state history”, with several law enforcement organizations working together to find it.

Mr. Boelter was arrested in a rural area with mainly agricultural land, fields and small woods, and placed in police custody “without any use” or police injury.

Police said he was armed during his arrest, but that he had not provided additional information on the type of weapons present.

The Surint Evans said that Mr. Boelter’s arrest had “made” a feeling of relief “to the communities and legislators who were on the list of suspect’s targets.

He also said that the police thought the suspect had acted alone and was not part of a wider network.

The authorities also condemned the identity by Mr. Boelter of a police officer while putting the attacks, affirming that “he exploited the confidence that our uniforms are supposed to represent”.

The governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz, also followed a plea of ​​civility, urging people to “shake hands” and “find common ground”.

“The unthinkable actions of a man have changed the state of Minnesota,” he said.

“This cannot be the norm. It cannot be the way we manage our political differences.”

Before the arrest of Mr. Boelter, his wife was detained in a traffic stop with three parents in a car in the city of Onamia, more than 100 miles from the family home on Saturday morning, but released after interrogation.

Mr. Boelter is expected to appear before the Minneapolis court at 1:30 p.m. local time (2:30 p.m. Hae; 6.30 p.m. GMT) on Monday.